Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers: Tactical Lego Fun and Function

As much as I like to be practical with my tactical, there is some room for fun, especially when color options are a required choice. And nothing comes closer to tactical color fun than playing with Magpul’s M-LOK Rail Covers.






Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers, type 2 to be specific, are textured polymer squares that snap into M-LOK holes on most aluminium M-LOK handguard rails. There are limitations in that the Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers do not fit properly with Magpul MOE M-LOK, nor the Magpul SL and SGA foregrips. The Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers lock into place with a second rectangular plug that provides a near seamless surface of contoured textured grip surface. And I've found that just a bit of grinding on the center section pillar can make the rail cover fit where a gas block limits the clearance.







The Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers sit barely over 1/8th inch above the rail, and use a snag-free design that covers the rail considerably more than most other options. At about two bucks a rail section, adding some custom color to your AR has never been as affordable or functional.


Technically, Magpul makes five different colors including black, flat dark earth, grey, olive drab green, and pink. Since each piece is actually two pieces, and an average handguard can take five covers in a row, that’s five times five times five or 125 different rail combinations possible. Thus the Lego comparison. For my “needs” i avoided the pink and focused on the remaining four colors which left me four times four times five or 80 different possible combinations. And with three rail sides to cover, that would expand the available rail cover color combinations across my rifle to 240.




With all those choices, I first needed to add some system to my thinking. By laying out the and inserts, I could organize my choices into visible comparisons. Some additional factors I considered included contrast, other colors already present on the AR, and my love of certain tactical colors.



After a solid half-hour of mixing and matching, I decided on a set of rail cover colors. Moving from the staging area to the rifle, I quickly realized I needed some specialized tools to rapidly remove the rail covers to avoid settling for a color combination out of laziness. I found that a Snap On angled pic and a Snap On nylon smoothing pry bar worked wonders for rapidly removing the rail covers with no risk of scuffing to cover or handguard.







Of course, being Magpul, the design of the M-LOK Rail Covers allows easy adjustment with nothing more than the tip of a 5.56mm bullet. .223 rounds work just as well, but when safely home, the Snap On tools work better, in my humble opinion.


My Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers playhouse for most of this review was a Noveske AR15 with a Noveske M-LOK handguard filled with M-LOK holes in need of M-LOK rail covers.
 



The Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers come in packages of six for a total weight per six of under one ounce. So covering three M-LOK rail sections with five panels each will only add 2.3 ounces to your rifle, yet customize it in a breathtaking way that’s sure to both make you smile and make your gun nearly invisible through custom camouflage. Nearly.











I mixed and matched variations and thought about the pros and cons of that particular color scheme. After an hour of trial and error, mostly trial, I settled on a couple designs. From there I took the combination into the wild to see how it fared. Frankly, it seems like pretty much any combination of the Magpul’s M-LOK Rail Covers is a win-win.



Like Legos, it’s fun to play around with different color combinations, and Magpul, whether intended or not, provided an effective rail cover solution that goes so far beyond traditional rail covers that you might just rethink your handguard in order to use the Magpul M-LOK Rail Covers.

The Magpul M-LOK Tripod Adaptor: Essential Hardware for Serious Shooters

If only the speed and dexterity of camera tripods could extend to rifle stability. Ahh, but there is a saddle-like apparatus that snipers have been using for years. But the three drawbacks of the saddles include price (good ones exceed $300), weight (good ones hover round one pound), and the saddles completely consume the tripod head thus preventing it from quick use with other attachments including spotting scopes, cameras, rangefinders, and the like. Enter the Magpul Magpul M-LOK Tripod Adaptor, a tremendous solution that solved all three problems in a one ounce $50 plate that seamlessly integrates the rifle into a stable support platform that is common across photography, and it follows the massive number of photo-oriented stability options.









Stable shooting platforms are not rare. From sticks and sandbags, to fence posts and pickup truck hoods, standard rifles smoothly slide around providing the shooter an optimum position. Then came the popular bench rests like the Caldwell Lead Sled. Now I love my Lead Sled for traditional rifle stocks, but the AR15 with its plethora of handguard configurations and accessories, tactical stocks, and especially the magwell filled with a stick up to a foot long. Further the stock-to-handguard alignment of an AR platform rifle tends to make it sit quite high in traditional rests. But what if you could just snap your AR into a tripod with the ease and security of a DSLR with large telephoto lens? Obviously you can since that is the point of this article. Enter the Magpul M-LOK Tripod Adaptor.





Bolting onto the underbelly of your handguard, the Magpul M-LOK Tripod Adaptor is barely apparent until it’s needed. In fact it makes are reasonable good handhold upgrade although not as efficient as Magpul’s own AFG.



The CNC machined aluminum plate is designed to integrate with the popular Manfrotto RC2 and Q2 interfaces. The small footprint of the plate provides ample strength to the system. With the average balance point of a typical AR15 somewhere around the magwell, the Magpul M-LOK Tripod Adaptor, mounted just forward of the magwell, safely and secures an AR platform rifle easily up to and over 10 pounds, in my estimation anyway. And that’s based on a quality tripod with an equally quality tripod head.




And speaking of tripod heads, a popular choice for the Magpul M-LOK Tripod Adaptor is a ball head tripod head, in specific one of Manfrotto’s heavy duty choices. A quality ball head allows both freedom of movement and adjustable drag giving a fluid (but not literally fluid as with fluid-head video tripod heads) motion.







One of the amazing aspects of using a Magpul M-LOK Tripod Adaptor and tripod support is the extreme diversity of shooting positions, heights, and angles. Basically, any direction a camera on a tripod can point at, an AR15 or AR10 can as well.



Depending on the particular tripod, from ground level to seven feet plus is possible, and pretty much any angle that allows the rifle to remain balance is possible as well. Many quality (and I mean quality) tripods have legs that can spread far beyond the usual 66 degrees or so. And speaking of tripod legs, I fully recommend metal or carbon fiber over anything plastic. And of the metal, I suggest round aluminum over rectangular or channeled aluminum. Of course you can use whatever you like, but it will be a rude awakening when you start popping off shots only to have your lightweight tripod collapse, twist or bend.

For those with more extensive needs, Magpul makes solutions for a popular railed tripod mount that not only mates with more advanced tripod heads, but slides back and forth for additional balance preferences. Magpul’s Dovetail Adaptor chassis rail for RSS and ARCA tripod head interfaces is the next step for those with greater stability needs. If the future for rifle tripod adaptors looks bright, Magpul just makes it blindingly bright.